


There Lies a Beast (and when it wakes you know it will not hide)

by AceQueenKing



Category: Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Empress Padmé Amidala, F/F, Gen, Imperial Amilyn Holdo, Insanity, Padmé Amidala Lives, Past Padmé Amidala/Anakin Skywalker, Set during an alternate universe version of The Empire Strikes Back, Sith Leia Organa, Sith Traditions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-09
Updated: 2018-09-09
Packaged: 2019-07-06 13:29:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,757
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15886992
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AceQueenKing/pseuds/AceQueenKing
Summary: Sometimes, Leia thinks Padmé Amidala Naberrie will drown the universe in her tears. Or, if not that, then let the streets run with blood. Perhaps Mother finds atonement for her dead husband and dead son in the blood she's spilled.There are times Leia cannot bear the unbearable heaviness of mother's wrath; thankfully, Amilyn doesn't give a damn about Leia's royal bloodline.





	There Lies a Beast (and when it wakes you know it will not hide)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kimaracretak](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kimaracretak/gifts).



> I tried to combine your Amilyn/Leia prompts + Padmé & Leia prompt for co-empresses.

Leia Amidala Naberrie, second of her line, waits for her mother impatiently, though she takes pride in thinking one would not know it. She is a statue, invulnerable and unmovable. Her muscles ache as she keeps her posture ramrod straight and tall. She is waiting for her mother's transmission to come through from Coruscant. She is co-empress in name, but in duty, she feels bound to her mother's law. She stares down at her locket. She knows if her mother sees her staring at the images inside, it will make her happy, if only for a little while.

Though in truth, looking at the locket does  _not_  bring Leia happiness.

She stares at the two images within the locket. The first one, her father, dead long before she was born in the dark wars that came  _Before_. Before Leia, before everything Leia has ever known to be true. Before the Empire, and somehow, before the Empress. Sometimes she wonders if her mother would be so cruel had he lived. She knows nothing of him beyond his portrait, though mother has often insisted he is still with them, in a way. They look little alike; Leia is as dark and fair as her mother. Her father was a Jedi, she knows. She wonders how that had never come between her  parents; perhaps he was not a good Jedi. Mother has not hesitated in slaughtering many who shared his faith. Or perhaps mother's objection to the Jedi came _After_. She suspects her mother's life is cleaved that way. The _Before_ , with her father, her mother cannot speak of. The _After_ is all that remains and Leia has never quite forgotten that she has always been her mother's second choice. 

She checks her chrono and frowns - it is not like mother to be late. But then, it is a bad day; the anniversary of her brother's theft, his remembrance day. Not the proper mourning, like her father got — her brother's body was never found. But the emptiness left behind by both their absences still lingers.

Mother put Luke's holo-image into her locket after he was taken, opposite her father.  _Don't forget, little star, don't forget_ , she'd hissed, over and over. Leia had huddled, scared, wondering why the Jedi had taken only her brother.

What was it that had made her a rejected child, even then? Did they feel it would burn their mother too wholly to take them both? (It would, Leia knows; mother almost razed the universe for Luke. Without Leia, she would burn it to nothing but scorched earth, as she had no reason to cling to life.)

She wonders if it is because she is too much her mother's child now, was too much her mother's babe even then. Her brother resembles their father, in as much as a toddler can resemble the parent: blond and soft and blue. She has never seen images of herself as a child. Her mother did not take any after Luke was gone; vanished, in the night, by a Jedi. Obi-Wan, she remembers, for mother has kept the high alert up for the next twenty years. Never  will Leia be allowed to forget the duplicity of the Jedi. Did he know, then, that he was dooming Leia to being alone? Did he know, then, what he was shaping her life to be? Did he know, then? _Did he know?_ Leia still wonders, unsure if she hates the Jedi or her mother more.

If Leia concentrates hard, she can still remember the days before her mother's weight pressed down upon Leia's shoulders. She can recall her brother, can remember his blue eyes and wide open arms and laughter. But those are memories that are not for mother now. Mother mourns still. Mother has held a knife to her own wrist, bleeding so long that she has no room for joy, for laughter. She knows only suffering.

Sometimes, Leia thinks Padmé Amidala Naberrie will drown the universe in her tears. Or, if not that, then let the streets run with blood. Perhaps Mother finds atonement for her dead husband and dead son in the blood she's spilled.

Waiting, Leia thinks of more pleasant things than her family. Leia thinks of Amilyn Holdo, no doubt pacing three floors below her, waiting for Leia to come back. Holdo is her admiral, not her mother's. Admiral Holdo is Gatalentan, and it is said they have long memories. Gatalenta was one of mother's first conquerings. Like many sacrificial lambs, it was in the wrong place at the wrong time. It had broken off from the Republic too early for Mon Mothma's Rebellion to defend it. She wonders, often, what her life would be had mother not come to Gatalenta.  But in a way, Leia is glad for her mother's rage, for Amilyn is not only her finest soldier but her only friend.

Amilyn is Leia's lifeblood.

It is not favoritism that has brought her up in the ranks, of course. Holdo is a competent officer. She is merciless in battle but hesitant to draw blood until no other option lies available to her.

But that is not why she is so precious to Leia. 

She is Leia's sanity. She doesn't give a damn about Leia's royal bloodline, or Leia's money, or Leia's powers, only that Leia is good for her and she, in turn, is good for Leia. Leia cannot stop herself of thinking of Amilyn. Her attention slips, thinking of lying upon Amilyn's lap and letting her beloved admiral rub her hair. For one moment, her iron will bends in supplication to a power greater than mother. Leia wants, more than anything, to ignore this meeting. Leia wants to go home to her quarters and curl up in Amilyn's arms. Leia wants to listen to Amilyn's heartbeat until the destiny on Leia's shoulders fades and the beast in her blood hides, for at least a little while. 

But these are not thoughts that Leia can dare admit to in her mother's presence. Holdo is not the sort of consort that mother would approve of: too rebellious, too merciful, too weak. Besides, Leia loves her too much to subject Amilyn to Mother's political machinations.

As if it knows her traitorous thoughts, the holo-corder in front of her springs to life. Leia lets all thought of Amilyn fly from her, fly back deep inside her where mother will not see it. She tries, though; she tries.  Mother's gaze burns in her enormous image, the yellow-brown eyes staring through Leia as if searching for her secrets. Leia feels scalded by the flame of mother's gaze, but she does not dare to draw away.

She knows, looking at her, that Padmé Amidala Naberrie, first of her line, is not well.

Mother has been crying; there are pink streaks in the white make-up. Leia doesn't know why mother bothers to preserve the traditions of their homeworld. It has been a long time since she was Queen of the Naboo; that, too, came in the _Before_. Did Palpatine, her predecessor, keep the traditions? She does not know. What little she knows of the time before her mother's reign, Leia only knows because of the history books she once scoured in desperation of finding something, anything, of the woman behind the Empress' gaze. There is little humanity left in her eyes; she is a remorseless sun now. She has mourned the universe, now she will punish it. Leia shivers in a move that is half anticipation, half fear.

"Mother," Leia whispers. "What troubles you?"

"There has been a great disturbance," her mother says, moving her hand. "Surely you have felt it? You are far more attuned to the force than I."

This, too, is true; Leia is far stronger in the force than her mother. When she was a child, she had assumed it had come from being trained from birth, not adapting to it in adulthood. Now she wonders if there isn't more to it. Perhaps it is that she is of mixed blood, Jedi and Sith both. Perhaps it is because she uses the force more than her mother, commits herself to feeding it more blood. Padmé Amidala is so removed from the war-torn universe on her icy throne. How long has it been since mother stepped foot off of Coruscant? She suspects it has been since grandfather Ruwee banished mother from coming home. Jobal and Ruwee had never been close to Leia; their eyes too full of sorrow.

Like mother, they too were hostages of the  _Before_.

"I have," Leia responds, tucking her locket back under her shirt. "I have felt it several times, this new presence."

It frightens her in truth; a being whose own gaze flits toward her, then backs off. It burns like mother, but the feeling is cold; more moonlight than sun. It is strange yet familiar, something that hurts as it hums, pleasantly, along with the beast in her bones.

"New and old." Her mother bites her lip - another bad sign, then smiles. "Your piety does you credit, my child. Your father would be proud."

Brining up the _f-word_  and changing topics - more bad signs. Leia's nerves hum with foreboding, a sure sign that her mother is in one of her worst moods. Leia can't remember the worst of mothers wrath, but she has heard stories enough. She knows her mother's power is not to be taken lightly. There are no Jedi anymore, after all. Though mother has only killed one by her own hand, the entire Jedi Order has crumpled at her command. Perhaps Palpatine started the extermination of that order, but mother? Mother did not hesitate in completing the cull, save _two_. And it is only a matter of time until Yoda and Obi-Wan are brought to justice.  Leia knows her mother cannot bear to harm her, even in her darkest of moods, but Leia also knows there are many cuts that mother could make.

Not all cuts are physical.

"I have discovered the identity of the Peacestar's terrorist," her mother says. Mother's mouth is quirked as if she tastes something sour. Leia wonders how many people have died for this mix-up. How red have her mother's fingers have been dyed, dipping into this knowledge? Leia did not like the Peacestar; an old design, one of Palpatine's. It was too crude for mother, a large weapon, but felt too politically dangerous to cancel. Leia did not weep when it fell, beyond the deaths of the good officers who served for it.

Mother does not wait for Leia to reply. She says, with some distaste: "His name is Luke Skywalker." She shares an image with Leia. A flashback burns her eyes- a young rebel, screaming as she utters the name  _Skywalker, Skywalker, it was Luke Skywalker_  over and over again. If mother shows any discontentment in viewing the torture, she does not comment on it.

"Oh," Leia says, understanding with sinking stomach. This is all mother's fears combined, and news delivered on the worst of all possible days for it. Mother had searched for her brother for years. Now, a man trumpeted their father's name.  It does not matter if it is her brother or a sick actor holding his name hostage. Mother will respond the same: anger, sadness. "Is it...?"

"We have reason to supect it is," mother says in short, clipped sentences. "When I dipped into her mind, I saw him." Her mother uses the force and Leia sees her vision. Luke Skywalker is a young man, hair blond as gold, smiling as Mon Mothma presents him a medal for killing billions. He is every inch the hero. To see him dressed up with her father's name must be an insult to mother, to taunt her with the shade of a man so long departed. "He looks like..."

Mother trails off, shaking her head. "No, no." She puffs out a strange, sad sigh. "No, please, not now, Ani, I can't —"

"Mother..." Leia Organa does not dare to breathe. These episodes, when mother believes father in the room, are the worst for her. They are rare enough she does not know how to fight it, but Leia knows mother is at her most dangerous now. Leia is powerless to combat the spirit of a ghost who exists more in mother's memory than anywhere else.

Mother has many idols, but none so sacred as her father.

"Do not interrupt me!" Her mother bellows. "He could  _destroy_  us, Leia, and all because you failed to identify him when the Peace Star was with the fleet. This is your fault." Mother's eyes are cold and shaky, yellow with flecks of sparkling sunlight. "Yes,  _your_  fault, Leia. Your father would be so disappointed in his wicked, _wicked_ child."

Leia feels the yellow grow behind her eyes, the lightning itch between her fingers. She wishes she could end it, wishes she had the strength to stop this madness. She is so, so tired of this. Tired of having to appease this cruel woman. Her mother may hold an empire tight between her unstable fingers, but Leia is aware of the stars that slip from her grasp. Leia isn't sure she believes in the Empire, and is even less sure she believes in her mother's mission. Leia hates this, this weakness, this  _fault._ It wasn't supposed to be this way. 

"He is only a boy," Leia says, forcing herself to remain as calm as she can will herself to be. For her beloved, if not for herself. "Even if Obi-Wan helps him, what of it? He is an old, decrepit man now. Not a threat to you, not any longer."

"The Force is strong with him still. His signature is like..." Her eyes waver once again; confusion. "Oh, no, Ani, don't punish her, she is wicked, yes, but..."

Leia winces, tries not to imagine what mother's courtiers must think of this show. Leia should re-route the  _Executor_  to Coruscant, should relieve her mother of command until she regains her sanity. This is bad; she has not seen mother attempt to talk to her long-dead father for a long time. Once, this was a secret she'd whispered to Leia, the idea that Anakin was still with them, somehow. Leia had believed it then but believes in phantom fathers no longer. Her mother, on the other hand...Leia bites her lip, considers her options, and does the only thing she can do to stabilize the Empress.

"It's not too late for him. If Obi-Wan has been training him all this time, then he will soon learn his entire life is based in lies." Leia sighs, not daring to look up at her mother as she tells her own falsehoods. She knows Luke is as unlikely to deviate — if this is Luke — as she is. She knows what she would ask is to change every fundamental truth of his life. Leia knows, firsthand, how hard such things to leave. But she knows, too, that mother will spare them both in no other way. "I could bring him back to us, mother. Surely he would join his family once more, once he knows his true origins."

In truth, she doubts this; doubts, in fact, if the boy is even her brother. It matters little, in the end.  Luke can no doubt no sooner betray Obi-Wan's Rebellion than she can betray her mother's Empire. 

Even if, perhaps, every pint of blood in their hearts longs to be somewhere, anywhere else.

Mother laughs, an odd bark. Madness laid bare in her eyes. "Oh, Leia. Such a filial child. Yes, yes, you will bring him back to us. I can see it."

"Yes, mother." Leia wonders if she should offer any proof of the fleet. If she should talk of her navy or if she should leave her co-empress to play with scyrings and shadows. In the end, she chooses the safest path, says nothing.

"You are dismissed, my beloved." Padmé Amidala says, and, with a horrible softness that only makes Leia feel worse, adds: "Take care. I  _cannot_  lose you, Leia. My little star."

"I know, mother," Leia says, her voice little more than a whisper. And the worst part is that, yes, Leia Naberrie knows this. Leia knows her mother's filament-thin connection to reality would snap if she had no child to care for. Perhaps Obi-Wan, long ago, knew this too. Leia knows too she will never, ever be uncleft from her mother's side, no matter how much she longs to.

The light of the holo-corder dims. Leia takes seven long, deep breaths as she waits for her pulse to slow to the point she can resume her duties. She counts, under her breath: one, two, three, four, five, six,  _seven_. Then she presses a hand to her personal comm unit. She asks Amilyn to join her in her quarters tonight to review strategies for the offensive on Hoth. That's a risky action — mother, like her predecessor Palpatine, has spies everywhere — but she  _needs_  Amilyn.

Leia needs her sanity after having spent so long touching madness.

Amilyn nods, just slightly, but it's enough to keep Leia sane as she goes back to being her mother's enforcer.

* *  *

Amilyn all but folds her into her arms as the night cycle begins and Leia comes to her door. She holds Leia softly, pressing kisses to her forehead, and for a moment all seems right in a universe very, very wrong.

"Another call?" She asks, and Leia nods, and that is all they say of it for long hours. Leia basks in Amilyn's kisses; here, Leia simply exists, cradled in the arms of a strong woman. How can she bare it, Leia wonders. How can Amilyn kiss her, love Leia so thoroughly, knowing she is loving her own conqueror?

Amilyn just smiles, then kisses her softly, kisses her sweetly. Leia tries to respond in turn but feels the force within her rising underneath her skin. The tautness of her chest shakes with the strength of all the horrors she holds at bay. And still, Amilyn kisses her, ignores the sparks of lightning that pull at her fingers as she plants a hot trail of kisses down Leia's chest. Amilyn ignores the sickly yellow of her eyes as Leia thinks, more than anything, of how she cannot bear to lose Amilyn. Leia thinks of how she would burn anything and anyone who would  _dare_  to touch her admiral and she wonders in those heart-stopping moments, in her quiet little deaths, just how different she and mother really are.

Hours later, when the sweat has cooled from their bodies, Amilyn kisses her shoulder and dares to ask the one question Leia is frightened of. "Do you want to run?"

Her finger traces a cool trail down Leia's body, traces potential paths that Leia cannot take. "I know a woman in the Rebellion. A Naboo, like you. She was on Gatalenta. Her name is Sabé. She could smuggle us to freedom, Leia, you and me. We could go to the outer rim, be pilots, mechanics, be _anything_ we want. It wouldn't be easy, but..."

Leia's tears fall onto the pillow in her small quarters. Amilyn grips her shoulder, saying nothing. Amilyn is good at letting her find her voice, but this time, she does not wait.

"Leia," she murmurs. "We can't keep doing this. The madness of your mother — it's terrible. We can't... _I can't_  keep seeing her destroy you like this."

"I know," she says, and she does. She does know. She wants to leave, but hers is a higher duty. Holdo begs her with sweet nothings until she falls asleep on Leia's shoulder but to no end. All Leia can think of is of her duty.

In the morning, they dress in almost identical uniforms.  Leia feels the weight of office fall back upon her as Holdo brushes one caring hand across her pauldron. 

"You don't have to do this," Amilyn says, a soft whisper. She presses one more tender kiss to her mouth, as if knowing the beast inside her blood is already stirring.

"I know," she says, feeling the weight of the universe come crashing down upon her heart. "I know. Stay?"

And she knows what she is asking, too. It is for total submission; for Amilyn to stay with her, for Amilyn to live in a cold and inhospitable place. Leia needs Amilyn to keep her demons at bay, and Amilyn knows it.

In the end, it isn't even really a question between them.  

"Of course," Holdo says, planting a trail of soft kisses on Leia's face. She knows it will hurt Amilyn to stay, but not as badly as it would hurt  _everyone_  if Leia were to leave.

"It won't last forever," Leia says, too quickly. She wants it to be true, even if she isn't sure it is.  "One day I'll — " and she does not say it, but she knows; one day, she will not be able to hold the beast back. One day, her mother's sorrow will grow too much. And on that day, Leia's own blood will swell and rise. And on that day, Leia will catch her mother's neck in her fingers and crush it easily, all too aware of the messiness of sinew and bone. She is Sith, as her mother is Sith; she has seen this future and knows, one day, she won't hold back. And one day, mother, perhaps, may even be relieved for it to come.  

But the joke is, of course, Leia is too loyal to her to do it just yet, cannot shake the feeling she owes her mother this much mercy. She herself is weak; she cannot imagine the ramifications for taking that final step. For there will be ramifications, that she knows; no Sith can break a master without being broken themselves. 

A new dawn for the Empire is coming, and Leia knows not what it will bring.

Perhaps it will be her, perhaps it will be Luke, but no matter the victor there — change is coming, and mother, as always, will be blind to it. 

"We will persevere," Amilyn says, then holds open the door. She will wait five minutes after Leia leaves before she herself does; such things, of course, can too easily be noticed.

Still, Leia counts the time, posture ramrod straight, and wonders how long she can bear to be held under mother's thumb. Her finger caresses an empty locket as she counts, eyes closed:  _one, two, three, four..._


End file.
